June 16, 2020 — Laura Kyrke-Smith, the IRC's UK Executive Director, said:
"The decision to merge the Department for International Development and the Foreign & Commonwealth Office puts the lives and livelihoods of the world’s most vulnerable people at risk.
Over more than two decades, DFID has led efforts to support millions of people caught up in conflict and crisis around the world. This has brought the UK international respect and influence and it is something that we all should be proud of as a modern, outward looking nation.
This decision comes in the midst of a global humanitarian emergency triggered by the spread of COVID-19. Just last week we saw images on our TV screens of cemeteries full to capacity in Yemen where, after a long and bloody conflict, the healthcare system is all but destroyed and there is nothing standing between the virus and the people.
This reorganisation of Government must not delay the immediate delivery of urgent aid for people whose lives are being devastated by conflict, crisis and now this deadly virus too.
As the Government works through how to implement this decision, the principles and approach that have allowed DFID to support millions of the world’s most vulnerable must not be abandoned."